This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

CBS profit plunges 96% on lower ad sales

I guess we're not supposed to blame Katie or David Letterman for this development:

CBS Corps second-quarter profit sank 96% on lower ad sales and one-time gain, but the media giant cited early signs of a recovery.

"As we anticipated, early signs of a recovery took hold in the second quarter," with results better than the first quarter, said Chief Executive Les Moonves.

He added CBS expects the second half of the year to be "considerably stronger" than the first. Mr. Moonves noted CBS was the only network to add viewers this summer and that "we also have a strong slate of syndication titles in the pipeline for release between now and year-end."

CBS has suffered from a steep downturn in ad revenue and is losing viewers to the Internet. The company slashed its dividend, and Standard & Poor's Ratings Services in June lowered its debt rating to one notch above junk, even after the company bought back debt with near- term maturities and issued longer-dated bonds.

For the latest quarter, CBS reported a profit of $15.4 million, or 2 cents a share, down from $408.4 million, or 61 cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding items such as a debt-extinguishment loss in the latest quarter and divestitures a year earlier, earnings fell to 8 cents a share from 49 cents.

15 comments:

What!? They did let him lie. They encouraged it....then they took it back and threw him to the wolves when it looked like the real big wigs were going down. Enter, phony internal investigation before the US Attorney got a hold of them.

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- CBS News has become the latest mainstream media outlet to come under criticism from pro-life advocates for covering up the abortion funding tucked away in the government-run health care plan.

The Associated Press had covered up the abortion funding but recently flip-flopped and admitted it exists.

Hey Les, maybe you should concentrate on landing just a few big sponsors, such as the Bucket Manufacturer's Association, for all CBS's water carrying for Obama?, the company that makes K-Y too ease your pain, and an entity involved in typeface technology, for old Danny boy?

CBS can disappear any day, and I will not even know it. I have not watched them in years. I have to laugh at the phony awards the networks pass around to each other. Katie won an award for something lame, and she is the pits, as the CBS news ratings steadily drop will bear out. The feminists will hate to see her fail, but she stinks, and nothing can change that. Letterman lost a lot of sponsors as did CBS over his attack on Gov. Palin’s daughters. Sponsors want a lot more information about programs before they place their money and good name on the line. I would sayit is about time.

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